


Dependence

by HyperKey (Sylverstia), Sylverstia



Series: Chronological Order [33]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mention of Death, Mutual Pining, Upgraded Connor | RK900 Has a Different Name, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-04-01
Packaged: 2019-12-29 20:15:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18301199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sylverstia/pseuds/HyperKey, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sylverstia/pseuds/Sylverstia
Summary: Gavin and Nines really need to talk.Neither of them wanted it to be like this.





	1. Chapter 1

Gavin lugged the suitcase out of the car and growled curses under his breath. He really didn’t want to go to Chicago to hold some sort of instruction to officers that were going to get androids assigned. He was the worst person for this.

“It will only be for two days.” Cory tried to reassure him when he closed the trunk.

“Should’ve taken Hank or something.”

“Hank is currently on sick leave and the precinct didn’t want to start this off with androids, so you were the next best choice, because you have experience.”

Gavin scoffed. “Experience in puzzling my partner back together, yeah.”

Cory stayed silent, unsure what to do. If there were no people watching, he would have hugged Gavin, maybe even kissed him. But Gavin didn’t like showing this to people. Not that they really did things often anyway. The last kiss they shared at been two months ago. But Gavin still wanted him around, so maybe it was just how Gavin did things.

“See you in two days then.” Gavin shrugged and lugged his suitcase along into the airport. He was already late. The plane was already boarding. Maybe the man should have walked a little faster than he did.

Cory wanted to respond, but all he managed to do was raise his hand in a somewhat broken wave and watch Gavin realize he was about to miss his plane. Then he was gone from sight within seconds, never looking back.

He got back into the car and drove it home and went back into the apartment without really thinking about it.

Was that what Connor had meant, about acting without thinking? He could definitely reconstruct what he did, retrace his steps, but he found that to be more effort than it was worth. Why did the house feel so empty? Gavin was only on away for two days.

Emma was already asleep. It was late, she had school the next day.

Cory wondered what to do. Usually he and Gavin would hang in the kitchen or the living room, talking about cases or plans for the next day. Sometimes Gavin just threw things at him to see how fast he could catch them.

None of this made any real sense.

He briefly wandered into the kitchen, realized there was no point for him to be there, so he went into the living room and turned on the TV. The local news station was babbling about unemployment, and he was about to switch channels when a breaking news story interrupted the program.

Within seconds Cory had connected a call to Gavin’s phone, only to realize it rang in the kitchen.

Gavin had forgotten his phone.

The plane he was on had crashed.

There were no survivors.

A heavy weight settled in Cory’s chest, robbed his breath and made his thirium pump race in speeds he had rarely witnessed.

This couldn’t be true.

That had to be a mistake.

His hands had clenched into the couch cushions, threatened to rip the fabric apart. He didn’t care. What did it matter now?

Gavin was dead.

No one survived plane crashes.

They were rare. But they were always devastating.

He couldn’t _breathe._

_This couldn’t be true!_

Desperation quickly took over his thinking and he lunged into the hallway, almost fell over a cat toy, scrabbled for the car-keys and slammed himself into the wall to break his fall.

What was he doing?

The plane had crashed seconds after takeoff. If there were any survivors, they would be severely injured. Most likely dying later. But if Gavin was still out there, he wanted to see him.

Long minutes had passed as he leaned against the wall and tried to calm himself down.

It was impossible.

He couldn’t calm down.

The sound of the keypad at the door being pressed had him jump. There was only four people who knew the combination, and two of them were in the house. He didn’t have time to think when the door opened.

Cory thought he saw a ghost.

Pale, shaken, most likely in shock. But definitely Gavin, standing there, shaking. He wasn’t injured, he was fine. He looked spooked, but there was nothing wrong with him. His suitcase was nowhere in sight.

Without a single word, Gavin marched into the apartment, threw the door shut and lunged at the android. Cory couldn’t control his actions at this point. The sob he tried to suppress escaped and made both of them jump.

Gavin’s fingers clawed deep into his back, body pressed into his as far is it could physically go. Cory tried not to squeeze him to death with his own grip. He couldn’t process what had happened. Things had been too confusing, too fast.

“I fucking love you…” Gavin whispered under his breath, voice tear laced and shaking.

Cory couldn’t process the words. He knew the meaning but he couldn’t find a response. He was surprised, shocked. All that escaped him was something between a sob and a whine and then Gavin’s hands ran over his back and his lips met his neck.

“It’s okay.” Gavin whispered through tears, gripped the android firmly, without any intention of letting go.

“I missed the plane, I’m okay.”

Cory could only nod. He knew the facts, bot that did little to ease his raging emotions. He couldn’t calm down, and errors were blaring at him about high stress levels. Gavin was just as shaken, he didn’t need to scan him to know that.

“Fuck…” Gavin hissed eventually. “…I gotta call Fowler…”

Slowly they managed to untangle each other’s limbs, but neither of them dared to let go completely. Cory’s firm grip on the detective’s hand was met with cool fingers interlaced into his own.

Gavin drew the android closer as he found his phone and called their boss. Cory rested his forehead on Gavin’s shoulder and willed his body to stop shaking. This needed to stop.

The detective trailed his hand up the android’s arm, around his back and gently rocked both of them. The call was a blur for Cory. He caught bits and pieces of words, Fowler telling Gavin that he was glad he wasn’t on the plane, and that he should visit the precincts psychologist. Gavin just dismissed it and eventually ended the call.

Gavin was slowly calming down, while Cory was still fighting his system, telling it to stop, trying to convince it that everything was fine. But whenever he let go of Gavin, it would scream at him.

Gavin seemed to sense it and turned his phone off, guided both of them into the living room. He turned the TV off and opened a cabinet.

Cory dared to take a look when there was a lot of clattering. Gavin flicked a switch and a vintage CD player came to life. He latched onto the fact. Manufactured in 2000. Made in china. Retail price of $59.99. Now ancient but still working. The device was older than Gavin.

Gavin pulled out a disk cover and opened it, slotted the disk into the player and waited for it to be read.

Cory was drawn in by the technology, how slow it was, how delicate Gavin treated it. For a brief moment he wanted Gavin to touch him just like that. Then the arm around him reminded him that the man was already doing that.

Gavin pressed two buttons on the device, and soft, calming music flittered through the room, through the massive surround system Gavin usually only used for the TV.

His system identified the track as ‘Waiting for a girl like you’ by foreigner. That meant nothing to him, but the sound was calming. Slow. 

“I need this…” Gavin whispered and closed his eyes, pulled Cory up against him again.

They stood in silence for a few moments, Cory listening to the music and finding that it calmed his stressed system in the same way Gavin was slowly calming.

Was that why music was used by humans? He never really had a good experience with that.

“…We gotta talk about this.” Gavin muttered then.

“A-about-“ Cory cursed his glitching voice box. He wasn’t okay yet.

“You freaking out like that.” Gavin said then. “You do give a fuck about me, right?”

The android flinched, then nodded. There was no point in denying it. “…The thought of you not being around… was painful. It… it _hurt._ ” Words swallowed by fresh tears, Gavin only held him tighter.

The detective kissed his neck again, the small patch of skin that was reachable due to the turtle neck. “When I heard what happened, my first thought was how you’d sit at home, freaking out. Guess I was right, huh?”

“You forgot your phone.”

“Yeah. It’s been a while since someone gave a fuck about me, okay? I gotta get used to that again.”

“You care about me too.” Cory stated silently.

Gavin drew back just enough to look into the steel blue eyes. “You kidding? If I didn’t care about you, I’d have kicked you out months ago with all those weird errors you keep having.”

“Thank you…”

Gavin scoffed, wrapped his arms around the android again and sighed. “Just to make this clear, I don’t say the _love_ thing a lot. But that doesn’t mean I don’t feel it, okay?” he muttered into Cory’s shirt and squeezed his shoulders.

“There are other ways to show someone you love them.” Cory muttered silently.

“Like what? Sex? We already ruled that out.”

A small laugh escaped the android. “You’ve been holding me for the past 30 minutes.”

“You too.”

Cory nodded.

“So, you care about me that way too? The love thing?”

The android struggled for words. “If I trust the descriptions of _love_ , then… I think this is ‘the love thing’.”

“Good.” Gavin whispered and kissed the android’s cheek. “then I don’t need to wait for permission anymore, huh?”

“I wasn’t aware you needed permission.”

“Hey, this is all about consent. Can’t have an android sue me for sexual advances…”

“People really have a wrong image of you.”

“And I really want it to stay that way.” Gavin whispered as he held Cory’s head and gently pulled him down to kiss his lips. “Don’t get me wrong, I am fucking shocked about what happened. But I am fucking happy I missed that plane.”

“I know you’re in shock. I can see it.”

“Stop scanning me.”

“Didn’t need to scan you.”

Gavin smirked. “Fuck, I don’t deserve you.”

“I’m sticking with you anyway. I don’t think I can exist without you, anymore.”

“Good. Because I don’t think I can let you go now.”


	2. Chapter 2

Gavin snapped awake when Cory suddenly gripped his hand. LED a glaring red in the dark room, giving it a somewhat eerie light. Almost threatening.

Gavin had fallen asleep with Cory resting next to him on the couch. How they made it work, he didn’t remember, but he knew he had been too tired to care.

“Errors?” Gavin whispered as the android buries his head into Gavin’s shirt.

Gavin could hear the fans working, felt his partner tremble and the rising heat from him. “No.” It was barely above a whisper.

At least that was ruled out. Gavin brought his arms around the android and gently pulled him on top of him. “You okay?”

Cory clung to him, almost as if scared to let go. Gavin knew, rested one hand on the android’s head and rubbed his back with the other. A shudder ran through his partner, followed by a hitched breath.

“I’m here. Not going anywhere.” Gavin didn’t know how this was supposed to continue. If Cory got overprotective now, things would go down the drain fast.

“Thank you…” The android whispered, and Gavin felt his shirt getting wet.

“Nightmares huh?”

It was only a nod that he got as an answer. But that worked. Better than Cory lying into his face about plain obvious things.

“I… I don’t understand-“

“Oh, I do.” Gavin scoffed. “Emotions are fucked like that. Wanna talk about it?”

Cory hesitated, then seemingly deflated with an exhale and scrambled even closer to the human. “…A loop. You dying.”

Gavin bit back a remark about it not being that bad if he could still talk about it. This was definitely not what Cory needed to hear now. And he had promised to keep an eye on his temper. At least around the android.

“Dreams are stupid. But it didn’t happen. No matter how real it felt, it was just a dream. Okay?”

“Yes.”

“You gotta let go of me now though. I really need to fucking piss.”

Cory only slowly sat up, followed his partner all the way through the hallway and insisted of waiting outside the door. Gavin knew he was going to get fed up if this continued any longer than a day or two. Hopefully Cory got his shit back together soon.

When Gavin returned to the hallway, Cory’s LED was still red, and the shaking had gotten worse. He tried to hide it, apparently aware how dumb it was. But it was happening anyway.

“I’m here.” Gavin whispered, gently guided the android into the bedroom.

Once in the sheets Cory made an effort not to get too close to the human. But he was watching. Gavin contemplated leaving him like that for a moment, then moved closer to the android. Wordlessly he snaked his arms around him and drew him close. Cory buried his head in his shoulder and Gavin could feel the racing thirium pump.

“Jesus this really fucked you up, huh?”

“It wasn’t my intention-“

Gavin squeezed him tight for a second. “Shut it. You’re new to the whole thing. It’s not like I never lost a lover before, I know how that feels like. And I think I know what you’re going through right now.” He sighed. “You’re in shock too, jus in case you haven’t realized.”

Cory was taken aback by the statement. “What makes you think-“

“I’ve been a cop for a long time, tin can. I know what to look for.”

“Is there anything I can do?”

Gavin shook his head. “Is not like I could get you treated for this shit, huh? Gotta wait it out. If it’s anything like it’s with humans, you’ll calm down eventually.”

“I will research on the topic.”

“Good idea. I’ll try to get a few days off from Fowler.”

“I wouldn’t want to have this affect my work-“

“And it will if you don’t address this.”

Silence engulfed them for several seconds, before Cory spoke again. “How did you manage to make everyone in the precinct believe you’re uncaring and incompetent?”

Gavin scoffed. “Maybe that’s part of the disguise. Detective, remember?”

Cory shifted closer to him, arms curled into his chest as he closed his eyes. “Thank you…”

“Don’t get sappy on me, tin can.”

“Only for tonight.” Cory whispered as he restarted his standby mode.

He wasn’t very confident to finish a full cycle without interruptions, but Gavin would be there. That was all that mattered.


End file.
